Today a dear friend of mine got a small design I created inked on his shoulder! And it made me so very happy :) He had told me that he was thinking getting a tattoo a while ago. He wanted a Trishula (three-spear) and had asked me to design one. Now he is a guy with a strong mind and a gentle heart. So I tried a few concepts like the third eye in the middle spear of the Trishula, a Trishula like a flower bud, and a Trishula with its spears on fire etc. There was one where I had an Om and the Trishula as the Chandra bindu (moon and dot) of the Om. And I also had one where the Trishula was made of the special characters we use in coding, this one was my favorite because he is one of the best C++ programmers I have come across :) He seemed to like the Om one and the one with code characters and we had to decide on one. So I ended up combining the two designs and he seemed to like the final one and he said he would get it done sometime soon. But today when he said he actually got it done, I was so thrilled. Many thanks to him! I realized how wonderful it feels to know that a friend chose to have my creation permanently inked.

Helsinki as I saw it

I have to start with this -

I have always had trouble in placing my carry on bag in the overhead bin, thanks to my height and strength! So most of the time I have travelled alone it's some guy who helps me put it up but this time in the Frankfurt to Helsinki flight when I lifted my bag as if I needed no help (I do this every time :D) and after it was evident that I needed help, I saw a lady get up and say "I'll get that" and she put the bag up there and smiled beautifully and took her seat. I thanked her with a big grin and my joy knew no bounds.

Then it was not difficult to notice that in Helsinki women were less hesitant than men. It also looked like most of the jobs that needed interaction with people frequently were taken by women. Later my colleague put it rightly that in Finland women socialized more than the men.

Next the weather -

Almost all the days I was in Helsinki it was bright and sunny. It was cold, yes, the lowest temperature was around -32 deg Celsius but it never was gloomy. The fresh snow and the brilliant sun was a perfect combination to brighten the mood. And there was Sauna to beat the cold anyway.

And then the people -

I have always thought these Finns are wonderful people, based on my interaction with a whole bunch of them at work and of course because I was a big fan of Kimi before I interacted with any Finns. A trip to Helsinki only confirmed that, they are simply nice and honest. Maybe the Finns in Helsinki are rawer. That's probably why I saw a guy cycling at -7 deg Celsius (and it was dark already) or why a taxi driver knew so much about Nokia, mobile platforms, Meego, Apple and the ecosystem they created etc. or why it looked safe for people to walk around the bus loop at 2:00 am in the night or why an elderly man tapped on my shoulder and asked if I was okay when I was sitting on a couch in a mall (I was all tired and jetlagged).

And then there were my friends from Bangalore, it was great to meet up with them and spend time talking like there was no tomorrow. And as a cherry on top I had the pleasure of sharing my trip with this gentleman from Vancouver who I call an-unusual-Finn as he can talk more than me!

And their art -

Like the people their art was also raw, honest, straight and some were brutal too, specially the contemporary art in Kaisma (Sara's Ekstrom's Limbus was on exhibit there). Ateneum had the Illusions of reality with the theme of paintings being the realities of a modern society and everyday lives of people.

And finally the roads -

It was so hard to walk on those slippery roads, it demanded my full attention. It almost felt like they were saying this - Stop running towards something all the time, do some justice to me, look at me, be with me, walk with care! And I did appreciate those roads in more ways than I imagined :)

Watched MJ's This is it yesterday. Very impressed and fascinated with his grace. I don't know if everyone sees what I saw, it maybe completely my perspective. For the entire duration I was fascinated by the perfect order that I was seeing in every single movement of his hands, legs, body. I am saying this because those videos were shot during the rehearsals, a show is different. There was absolutely no movement that was out of place, and I couldn't see that order in any of the dancers that danced with him. Of course I am not disrespecting those dancers, I know they were a set of talented dancers selected by MJ himself but I am talking about the 'perfect order all the time', I couldn't see that in anyone. It should be because it's his style and it comes naturally to him. But I must say I was amazed and inspired to a very great extent than my expectations. The memory of his long graceful hands will remain forever.

So here it is, the painting where I was experimenting the other two complementary pairs: green-red and yellow-violet. I went to the market in search of flowers to paint as my subject but the moment I looked at the watermelon (small one) I wanted to paint it. Since it was green I bought a bunch of tomatoes as my other subject. After trying out with a few compositions, settled down on this one where I decided to have the subjects placed an a table (which was going to be yellow-violet :)).

It was fun painting this one and I was trying out different brush strokes instead of just making it smooth. In the next class one of my classmates and James (my teacher) pointed out that I might have used Divisionism and a bit of Pointillism in my work. I didn't know what those techniques were, found out about them later. It's interesting that it (divisionism) is based on the science that optical mixing of colors happen and it is not necessary to mix the colors physically all the time.

When I told about this to Chinnu he was telling me how art is supposed to be intuitive and all that but it definitely helps in knowing the science behind it as it makes it faster and it won't take away any creativity or intuitiveness from us.

In the last class James was telling us about the use of Geometry in paintings, which again is arguable that it's not intuitive. Maybe not all the painters used/use it consciously but it is true that images look more pleasing to the eyes when they are proportionate so I think knowing about it only makes it easier and makes us more confident to use it.

The other paintings that I made in the class are uploaded here.